How Well Do You Know the Coquihalla?

The Coquihalla is one of the most popular highway mountain passes in BC. You’ve probably driven it a few times, whether as a commuter or a BC traveller, or TONS of times as a commercial driver. But how well do you know this stretch of highway?

GENERAL

The length of the Coquihalla, per construction phase:

Phase 1 from Hope to Merritt: 110km

Phase 2 from Merritt to Kamloops: 87km

Phase 3 from Merritt to Kelowna: 127km

The Coq starts near sea level at Hope and then gains over a kilometre in elevation in less than 50km distance.

Travel time savings:

vs. the old Highway 3 Route – from Kelowna area you save approximately 70km of travel or/and an 1h30mins

vs the old Fraser Canyon Route – from the Kamloops (and Trans Canada) way you save approximately 70km and 1h10mins

Coquihalla Opening:

Phase 1 opened in May 1986 (Hope to Merritt)

Phase 2 was completed on Sept 4, 1987 (Merritt to Kamloops)

Phase 3 was completed on Oct 1, 1990 (The Coquihalla Connector from Merritt to West Kelowna )

Highest elevations:

Coquihalla summit: 1,244 m

Surrey Lake summit: 1,444 m

Named the Coquihalla because it generally follows the Coquihalla River and uses the Coquihalla Pass

The small signs in the shape of old steam locomotives, with Shakespearean names, along the highway are there to commemorate the approximate locations of the Kettle Valley Railway

WINTER

Since the winter of 1990/1991, in regards to avalanche closures…

Less than one closure per year due to avalanche hazard, specifically .96 per year over 25 years

13 out of the last 25 years had no closures due to avalanche hazard.

Of all the 24 avalanche closures, 11 were under 2 hours

The Coquihalla averages 1,350mm of precipitation of which 1,150mm falls as snow.

The annual average peak snowpack (depth of snow on the ground) is 235cm at the summit.

There are many “tools” engineered into the design of the Coquihalla Highway to reduce the likelihood of avalanches affecting the route, which is why the Coquihalla sees less frequent closures for avalanche hazard and avalanche control than many other mountain passes in the province. These defenses include:

Road alignment designed to use Boston Bar creek as a natural catchment area.

Ten earth structures (stopping dams and mounds) which you probably wouldn’t notice because they are now covered with vegetation.

There is also one concrete stopping wall and one snow shed.

Winter maintenance:

Average amount of winter abrasive used yearly: 40,000 m3

Average amount of anti-icing liquid used yearly: 3 million litres.

During storm events, in addition to other equipment and snow plows VSA maintenance uses 3 tow plows which can clear two lanes at a time. Two of these plows spend 100% of their time on the Coquihalla from Hope to Kamloops.

The top 3 reasons for closures on the Coquihalla (in order of time spent) are

Collisions (when a vehicle crashes into something) and the subsequent investigation and clean up

High avalanche hazards

TRAFFIC

Highest daily volume for traffic:

BC day long weekend (29,114 on August 1, 2014)

Percent of that truck traffic: 22%

Annual Average Daily Traffic (AADT): 10,569

3.3 million Annual VKT/km (VKT/km represents the annual vehicle kilometres travelled, divided by the length of the roadway)

Busiest traffic month: August (based on 2012 stats)

The Coquihalla has twice or more the volume of traffic compared to any other highway that crosses a mountain path in BC. (based on 2012 stats)

From 2004 to 2010

Truck traffic increased 6%

Personal vehicle traffic increased 5%

We hope that answered some questions or piqued your curiosity around the Coq. It’s an interesting stretch of highway that comes with its unique challenges but our district staff and maintenance contractors will continue to monitor the Coquihalla and keep you moving as efficiently and as safely as possible.

I have not been able to find information on Surrey Lake Summit on the website. I was wondering if you had the information on the percent grade climbing up Surrey Lake Summit. Also I read that Surrey Lake Summit was formerly known as Clapperton Creek Summit. I was hoping you could either confirm or deny this. Any information would be very helpful.

Could you provide on how many times the Coquihalla has been closed during the winter months and whether that closure was due to an incident (i.e. an accident) or some other factor? Number of closures for the last 10 years would be sufficient.

What you see are likely the old avalanche howitzer guns and bases that are roadside within avalanche paths. We used to use the guns for avalanche control in the area, but the ministry now use helicopters to detonate explosives and trigger controlled avalanches. Here’s a blog we wrote about our avalanche program and with a video of an controlled avalanche completed using a helicopter: http://tranbc.ca/2016/03/24/what-its-like-to-watch-an-avalanche-from-a-helicopter/

The government website you provide states that the entire Coquihalla highway (i.e., Hope to Kamloops) is restricted. But that’s not the entire story because there are signs on the highway directing bicyclists, so clearly it can be used. How confusing! Can you guys find out the answer to Brian’s question? I would like to know, too.

I am puzzled by the statistic “Annual vehicle kilometres travelled (VKT): 3.3 million” which appears in the page about the Coquihalla. I saw this in the Vancouver Province this morning and wondered if it could be true – it was easy to trace it to this web page.

I note that you give average daily traffic at 10,569 which works out to 3.9 million trips per year. If the total distance travelled is 3.3 million km, this works out to less than 1 km per trip. Unless my logic is incorrect, something is wrong here.

To get a comparison I went to easily available statistics from Alberta

Thanks for bringing this to our attention. The original statistic should have read 3.3 million annual VKT/km, instead of 3.3 million annual VKT. VKT/km represents the annual VKT divided by the length of the roadway, and provides a good relative indicator of the average intensity of usage over the length of each highway. Hope that this helps.

I think that publishing the annual VKT would be more meaningful to the general public. Also the total trips in addition to the average per day – these are impressive numbers showing the importance of the Coquihalla to travellers in BC.

I have driven the highway dozens of times, the majority being 97C, but lots to Vancouver too. It’s a fine highway. But being its a high mountain road, you have to be prepared and drive to the conditions. NO highway should be demonized because of the idiots who don’t know what they are doing. Too much horsepower with too little brains.